


red revealed

by robin_hoods



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Little Red Riding Hood, Dissociation, Fairy Tale Retellings, Implied Relationships, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M, Story within a Story, Stream of Consciousness, Unreliable Narrator, What Was I Thinking?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-22
Updated: 2013-08-22
Packaged: 2017-12-24 08:16:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/937692
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/robin_hoods/pseuds/robin_hoods
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The cloak isn't red, but pink, Bolton pink.</p><p>(Reek remembers this story.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	red revealed

**Author's Note:**

> I wanted to write something for thramsay week, saw [this](http://asoiafkinkmeme.livejournal.com/19312.html?thread=12973168#t12973168) Red Riding Hood prompt at the kink meme, and thought, why not? Unfortunately it came out a little weird, I think. I'll just let you guys judge.
> 
> (Although I do feel like I need to mention I put those warnings up there for a reason. This is not a happy fic.)

Reek remembers this story.

He shouldn't – _what if Ramsay finds out_ – but he does. He remembers helpless little girls and the wolf's sharp claws digging into his- her back, and she can never escape, not unless she wants to die. So one day she dons her pretty red cloak, pretends to shiver from anticipation, and leaves the safety of her home.

They (who are they?) tell her not to go. Reek remembers that. They tell her not to go, and yet she does; under the pretense of family that needs her, that _wants_ her, she goes. She doesn't even know their names, and yet she goes.

Reek thinks his sister might have told this story once. Or maybe Mother did. Father never was one for stories, even ones defiling greenlanders. But Reek has no sister, and no parents. He has nobody at all, nobody except Ramsay, and there is nothing about Ramsay's face or hands or smile that could possibly remind Reek of a home he never had.

He clenches his eyes shut, and curls the fingers he has left into fists, trying to stop them from feeling numb. Most nights, his non-existent fingers hurt more than the ones he still has, as if... He doesn't finish the thought, doesn't allow himself to, but some nights he sees things, and feels things. If he closes his eyes he can pretend he is the only one in the room, and that all ten fingers on his hands are still his.

She never ran. Brave and silly girl she was, she did not run (and even if Reek wanted to, he could not have run). Her footsteps, Reek thinks, would they be sure and confident, or would they be careful and slow? Would she know which path to follow, what road would lead home, or would she be tempted along the way to stray off the path, to lose her way, until all that defined her was her warm, red cloak. Does she remember her name?

(Hers doesn't rhyme with anything. (Reek, sneak, weak, bleak, freak.) It rhymes with nothing at all.)

Reek remembers this story. He shouldn't, but he does. He remembers gaping jaws and sharp teeth, sharper claws, but the eyes, they are the sharpest. She shouldn't speak to him, but she does. Is she lost, he wants to know. She denies it, but she does not recognise these woods, and were it not that she gazed up to these stars every night, she might not have recognised those either.

Reek can't remember when he last saw the stars, or how long it has been since Ramsay locked that heavy wooden door. At first, he counted for how long it took for the ache to subside, but now, there is no point to that. Some part of him always hurts.

The girl waves him off, the man with the sharp teeth and the knowing smile, and she goes on her way, stepping over loose branches, and looking over her shoulder whenever the woods make a suspicious noise. But at last, she's there, at her destination. (Reek is not, Reek's place is here, in the dungeon, where no man will ever see daylight again. But than, Reek is no man. He is no one at all.)

Reek shivers. There is no need for it, because a thick cloak is covering his thin, naked body – not red, not red, but pink, Bolton pink – soft and warm. He remembers. His shoulders were once bare, and he was lost, very lost, and he can't see. The torch has gone out. If he strains his ears, he can hear water drip, but he's not allowed to-- what if he hears? At least he hears no one screams today.

And no one can hear Reek's shallow breaths in the darkness.

She can't see either. No candles are lit, but she can hear them (who are they?) breathe, their breath hot on her neck. Now, she wishes she hadn't gone at all. “Come closer, my child,” a male voice says through the thick cloak of darkness, “come closer, so I can admire you in the light of the moon.” A thin sliver of light falls through the curtains, onto the bed in the corner of the room.

There are thin strands of hair on the floor; maybe his, Reek thinks. But nothing is his. Not the dirt under his nails, or the blood on his skin, or the dried tears on his cheeks. He shivers, and curls further into himself; his entire body nearly disappears underneath the cloak.

She steps forward, into the light, and tries to see a familiar face in the bed, but all she can see is a dark shadow with two stars in their midst for eyes. “Closer, dear,” the voice says, and she sees the spark of something else in the dark, “my eyes are not what they used to be.”

Reek remembers this part. He remembers shadows dancing on the walls of Asha's bedchamber, her fingers growing into long claws and her teeth revealing themselves when she snarled. Reek remembers, but he shouldn't. Reek needs no eyes to see, and no ears to hear, and no mouth to speak. He shouldn't know, but he does. And Lord Ramsay, he would... Reek dares to open his eyes, but sees nothing.

She does, though. “Uncle,” she says, because that's who he might be, or maybe not, “why would your ears be so large?”

So he can hear what you are thinking, Reek thinks, and hides his face between his hands. So he knows when you are a liar, so he can hear you say your name, so you know that he always knows.

“Uncle,” she says, again, “but why would your nails be so sharp, and your hands so big?”

So he can hold you down, Reek thinks, and hold your jaw between his fingers, and draw neat little circles on your exposed (naked) belly.

“But Uncle,” she says, now taking a step back in fear, because he is grinning, and she doesn't like it. “Why would your teeth...” She does not finish the sentence.

Reek thinks nothing at all. He stretches out his hand, the one with only three fingers, and grips down tightly into cloth. So he can eat your fear, he finally thinks, so he can eat your face, your name. Take bite after bite until there is nothing left. Reek is nobody. Ramsay ate him whole.

A wrecked sob cracks through his body, and his hand tightens, further and further, his forehead resting on the floor.

Her father always told her... Reek pauses. He doesn't know what he might have told her. Be brave, it might have been. Be strong. Never forget. He doesn't know. It doesn't matter. In her hand, she tightly gripped her knife, and when the beast tore out of bed to swallow her whole, all she had to do was cut up in a straight line. All Reek had to do was...

Reek wraps the cloak around himself, (pink, _pink_ , not red) – although the edges are stained and the blood might have been his or hers or theirs. He shivers. He doesn't let go.

“Open your eyes,” a voice might have said. Might have commanded. He didn't, but does now, and he is lying on the floor, covered in a cloak that might have been pink (once), and there is a cold body, a dead body, a knife in the dirt.

Reek doesn't know how long it's been, but he still aches, his stomach still clenches, and the blood drying on his thighs slowly turns brown. He can't see, and he doesn't remember. (But she does. And she goes home.)


End file.
